


Win or Lose

by WorryinglyInnocent



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Clerk!Gold, Comfort, Courtroom AU, F/M, Lawyer!Belle, NSFW, PWP, Rumbelle Order In The Court, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-11
Updated: 2017-04-11
Packaged: 2018-10-17 15:22:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10596771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WorryinglyInnocent/pseuds/WorryinglyInnocent
Summary: After losing her case, lawyer Belle seeks comfort from a long time friend, courtroom clerk Gold. Their frank conversation takes a turn that both want, but neither had dared to hope for.Written for Rumbelle Order in the Court, 11/04/2017.





	

**Author's Note:**

> [NB: This is set in the UK as I’m much more familiar with my own legal system.]

 

There were days when Belle thought of her job as more than a career, as something similar to a calling. She had known what she had wanted to do with her life as soon as she was old enough to understand the function of a lawyer in society. Truth, the pursuit of justice, being a voice for those who could not advocate for themselves… These were all things that she believed in with a passion and things that she had always worked tirelessly towards. No matter how heavy the day was, no matter how emotionally draining a case might be, Belle knew that she was doing the right thing, a good thing, and that was what kept her going through even the most unsavoury of discussions. She’d had her fair share of sleepless nights throughout some of the cases that she had worked on, but she could always rest easy once she knew that the victim had seen justice and the perpetrator had received the punishment that they deserved.

There were other days when Belle absolutely loathed her job and wondered if she could ever make a true difference in the world, considering packing it all in and going over to her back-up career of being a children’s librarian rather than a CPS prosecutor.

Today was one of those days.

There was no shadow of a doubt in Belle’s mind that the defendant had been guilty. The evidence against him was overwhelming. The victim had held her own on the stand throughout a vicious cross-examination. She and her team had done everything they possibly could.

And yet the vile creature had walked away. Not guilty. Belle glared over at the empty jury box, feeling the bile rise in her throat. Twelve decent men and women so swayed by a pretty face and crocodile tears in the dock, by the defence counsel stressing just how much these accusations had damaged the poor boy’s life, ignoring the effect on the life of his victim. Not his only victim, if Belle’s gut instinct was to be believed, but only one girl had had the courage to come forward.

She shook her head. She couldn’t blame the jury. Well, she could, they were the ones who had made the decision, after all, but in the end, that was the cornerstone of the legal system that she worked so hard to uphold. There could be no justice without the jury, even though Belle wanted to track down every last one of them and strangle them with her bare hands. This case had been a difficult one for the entire team, and the loss had been a hard one to bear for everyone. All they could do was to keep going, keep working, and work even harder to make sure that the next time a case like this crossed their paths, they would get the result that they wanted. Conviction and justice.

She leaned back in her seat, unwilling to leave the courtroom even though she could hear that the building was winding down for the night and the caretakers would be coming to lock up soon enough. Everyone else had long since left, but Belle was still here, her paperwork spread out on the solicitors’ bench in front of her. She was always the last to leave the courtroom when she lost a case. She needed that solitude in the grandiose surroundings, to sober her tumultuous thoughts and remind her that she was just one small part of a system that was so much bigger than herself, a system that ultimately, she had no control over. She gazed up at the small carved figure of Lady Justice above the judges’ bench. Usually Belle found her to be a calming sight, her blindfolded eyes and her sword and scales held high and true. She had lost one case but she would win another, everything balancing in the end.

Not today, though. Today, Belle wanted to run Lady Justice through with her own damn sword.

“Justice is blind,” she muttered bitterly to herself. “Well, you were blind today, weren’t you?” she yelled to the statue, pointing an accusatory finger at the witness box. “You didn’t see the smarmy bastard standing there!”

“Belle?”

Belle tore her mutinous gaze away from Lady Justice to see Mr Gold peering around the door into the courtroom, looking slightly worried, and her ire died at the sight of him, her shoulders sagging as if all the air had been forced out of her.

“Belle, are you all right?”

She gave a slow nod, not meeting his eyes and shuffling her papers together. No-one could ever stay angry very long when Mr Gold was around. He had a strange kind of calming influence that followed him around; it was almost otherworldly. He’d been working at the court for as long as Belle could remember, certainly for as long as she had been coming here.

“I’m fine,” she said, horribly aware of how dejected and evidently not fine she sounded. “What are you doing here, anyway?”

Gold gave a soft huff of laughter and came over to her, moving slowly across the courtroom floor, cane tapping steadily, and he took the seat beside her.

“I could ask you the same question. All the other lawyers went home quite some time ago.”

“I know.” She raised an eyebrow. “I’m pretty sure all the other clerks must have gone home quite some time ago as well. Are the rumours true, then?”

“What rumours?”

“That you do in fact live here and you sleep under the judges’ bench in courtroom one.”

Well, he _was_ part of the furniture. Everyone in Belle’s CPS branch had told her that she was guaranteed to get at least one trial with Gold as the courtroom clerk. No-one had ever seen him outside of the court building and more than one person had put forward the theory that he was in fact the ghost of a particularly moody judge who was now doomed to wander the courtrooms forever having been too strict in his sentencing. Belle drew the line at believing that one. He was a mysterious man by anyone’s imagination, but he was definitely flesh and blood.

Rather attractive flesh and blood, if she was being honest with herself, but that really wasn’t a thought to pursue right now.

“Drat, my greatest secret has been found out.” Gold gave a dramatic sigh. “Sadly, my reasons for being here are far more mundane. Since your case finished a day early, they’re moving the West case in here tomorrow. I just wanted to make sure that everything was as it should be.”

“I guess that my being here isn’t as it should be.”

“Well, unless you were planning to sit in on the West case, I should imagine that you’ll be gone by the time the hearing begins. I mean, you’re more than welcome to join us,” he added hastily. “You do make for a far more aesthetically pleasing courtroom than Mr Spencer does, at any rate, and I for one would not be unhappy to have you brighten my day.”

Belle turned away with an embarrassed cough. He was only being polite, she told herself. Trying to make her feel better since it was obvious that she was down.

It was not the first time that Gold had found her here in the courtroom after a trial had ended. Belle was under no illusions that it would be the last. He always seemed to know what to say, and right now, his presence beside her was a comfort. Employed by the court, Gold was a neutral party, the clerks treating prosecution and defence with equal deference, but Belle knew that he had his opinions on the defendants’ guilt and innocence just as much as the next person, and the fact that he could keep his calm neutrality in the face of the moral conflicts he saw every day, and had been seeing for years, fed Belle a certain strength, the reassuring thought that she would get through this period of self-doubt.

“You disagreed with the jury’s decision, then?” Gold asked.

Belle snorted. “However did you guess?”

“I won’t grace that with an answer. For what it’s worth, from what I know of this case, I thought that he was guilty too.”

“Everyone in the room thought he was guilty. Apart from defence counsel and the jury, evidently.” Belle glared at the empty jury box again, then turned back to Gold. There was something about the way the light caught the silver in his hair that made Belle want to run her hands through it. He probably wouldn’t appreciate that though, and she gave herself a little shake, pushing the thoughts firmly from her mind and busying herself with her papers again to try and distract her and occupy her hands. Gold was a friend, nothing more. He was a nice man, if reticent and mysterious, who would pick her up when she was feeling down, and that was all there was to it. He was a friend.

A friend that she might have developed a little bit of a crush on the first time that she met him.

“Belle…”

Belle turned to him. It had taken her so long to get him to use her first name, rather than calling her Ms French all the time. She thought she was probably the only lawyer in the city with whom he had conceded to be slightly less formal outside of trial, but after they’d bumped into each other at the coffee machine for the fifth time, Belle had insisted upon it, and as her work in her chosen field showed, when she wanted something, she went after it with a vengeance.

“Belle, you mustn’t beat yourself up about this.”

“I’m not,” Belle began to protest, but Gold just shook his head with a wan smile.

“You are,” he said. “I can tell. I’ve sat here beside you after trials enough times to know what you’re thinking. You’re reliving it all in your head, wondering where it all went wrong, wondering what you could do differently if you could do it all over again.”

Belle sighed. He was right, of course. He always was. She remembered the first trial she had ever been involved in, in this very courtroom. Courtroom three. Her first trial and her first loss. He had found her in here long after everyone else had left, crying into her files at the injustices of the world.

_“Ms French?”_

_Belle looked up, wiping her eyes to see Mr Gold hovering beside her, holding out a handkerchief._

_“I’m sorry,” she mumbled. “I should be going.”_

_“It’s quite all right, Ms French,” he said, voice soothing as a firm hand on her shoulder prevented her from making a break for it, and he slid into the barristers’ bench in front of her, hooking his cane over the desk. “Take as long as you need.”_

_Belle blew her nose and dried her eyes, and as composure returned, she took a moment to study the man in front of her._

_“Do you do this with every young lawyer who loses a case?” she asked._

_Gold shook his head. “Only the ones I find crying in my courtrooms after hours.”_

_She shifted in her seat, embarrassed. “Yeah, about that…”_

_“Don’t worry.” Gold gave a soft chuckle. “You’re not the first to break down in an empty courtroom,” he said. “I’ve had lawyers more experienced than you start throwing things at the witness box. You win some, you lose some. It’s always been the way.”_

_“It sucks,” Belle muttered._

_“It’s justice. She’s blind. No-one ever said that she was fair.”_

_“How can you be like that?” Belle exclaimed._

_“Like what?”_

_“So… Calm! So accepting!”_

_Gold just smiled. “You’re just beginning your career, and you’re full of the righteous indignation that led you to this path in the first place. I’ve been around long enough and been jaded long enough to accept that this is the way the world works.”_

_“So I should just become a cynic, is that it?” Belle sniffed._

_“No, Ms French.” His face was completely in earnest as he spoke. “No, you need to keep your fire and your passion for as long as you can. You asked me how I can be so calm about it all. That’s how. But my point is that you don’t have to be calm. You have to go back out there and accept that whilst you lost this case, there are other cases out there, other victims who need you to advocate for them and bring them the justice that they deserve. You have to keep fighting.”_

That was the first inkling she’d had of his past. The look in his eyes… She knew that he had been like her once. Young and passionate and determined to do the right thing. Something had twisted in him; his fire had burned out and left him cynical, and he was determined that she would not suffer that same fate.

She turned to him now. It might have been a few years since that first evening in the courtroom together, but nothing had really changed.

Except that over time, he had started sitting beside her, rather than in the barristers’ bench in front. Over time, their conversations had turned from simple comfort to more challenging debates about justice and the way the system worked, that both helped her to understand the man beside her and took her mind off whatever it was that had upset her in the first place.

“I know what you need,” Gold said sagely. “Come with me.”

He grabbed his cane and moved swiftly through the courtroom; Belle gathered up her papers and shoved them in her bag before trotting along after him and following him through the doors into the clerks’ office. She’d never been in this part of the building before and found that it was a cosy room.

“This is the first time I’ve been in your office,” she said, and then mentally kicked herself for saying something so totally unnecessary. Of course Gold knew that she had never been in his office before. She’d never had any reason to come in here.

Gold laughed. “Yes, this is where we hibernate when we’re not in courtrooms. We hang upside down in the filing cabinets away from natural light.”

Belle just raised an eyebrow, but she couldn’t help giving a little snort of laughter, and she had to admit, it did make her feel better to be able to laugh at a stupid joke after the day she’d been through. Gold indicated for her to take a seat at what was evidently his desk, and busied himself with making tea.

“Really, Gold, you don’t have to,” Belle protested.

“I want to,” he assured her. “You need a cup of tea and hot beverages aren’t allowed in the courtroom.”

She gave a soft snort of laughter. “You know, sometimes I get the impression that you have more respect for the room itself than the people in it.”

“I often do.” He didn’t sound at all ashamed of the fact. “When you’ve seen as many barristers and judges come and go as I have, there are very few who earn your full respect.”

Belle murmured her thanks as her handed her a cup, and she blew on the surface of the steaming tea to cool it.

“What about me?” she asked. “Where do I fit in your hierarchy of respect?”

“Belle…” He sighed, looking away from her, and Belle thought that she could see colour rising in his cheeks.

“Gold?” she pressed.

“Belle, you’ve always had my utmost respect. You’re so passionate about your cause, so sharp and intelligent with it, and I’ve witnessed first hand how invested you are in these cases and in getting the result that you want not for your own prestige, but for your victim to receive justice and closure.” He finally looked up at her, smiling. “That is something I will always respect.”

Belle felt the heat suffuse her face at his earnest compliments.

“Thank you,” she mumbled.

“You’re very welcome. You are a wonderful lawyer, Belle, a wonderful young woman in general. The outcome of this case or any other makes no difference to that.”

“You always know just what to say to make me feel better.” She gave a weak smile and glanced over at him again from her teacup. “How do you do it?”

“I just tell the truth.” Gold shrugged, leaning on his desk with his own cup.

“You’re a very lovely man, Mr Gold.”

“Rum.”

Belle quirked an eyebrow.

“Rum. You can call me Rum. I’ve been calling you Belle all this time, it seems only fair that you should call me by my first name too.”

“Rum.” Belle turned the simple word over in her mind. It suited him. “You’re a very lovely man, Rum.”

He gave a bark of sharp laughter with no humour behind it.

“There are a lot of people who would refute that statement,” he said.

“Well, I don’t know them.”

“I wasn’t always a court clerk, you know,” he added.

“I had guessed that.”

“I think ‘ruthless’ was one of the politer terms used to describe my legal career.”

Belle laughed. “I think we’re all a bit ruthless. It’s one of the job requirements.” She shrugged. “I don’t care what you might have done in your legal career.” She paused. “Why are you telling me this?”

Gold didn’t respond for a long time, staring into the depths of his half-drunk tea as if it contained all the answers to life, the universe, and everything.

“Because you said that I was a lovely man, and I thought I ought to disabuse you of that notion before it took root.”

“Mr Gold - Rum - it took root long ago. You’re not going to be able to break it in a fingersnap.”

“Not even when I tell you I used to be the barrister fighting against the victims you fight so hard for?” He paused. “I am not a nice man, Belle.”

“You were doing your job. A job that you no longer do and I can tell that you feel bitterly about. I might not agree with it, but I understand it. The fundamental core to our legal system is that everyone has the right to legal representation and yes, that means that someone’s always going to be fighting against me, and because of the way our system works, we have to fight viciously. I fight viciously for the prosecution and you fought viciously for the defence. Contrary to popular belief, I don’t hate the defence counsel for doing their job.”

Gold snorted. “You know, I really didn’t intend for the conversation to take this turn. I’m sorry. I’d intended to cheer you up and here you are, massaging my own ego. Just… forget I said anything.”

“Well, I can’t do that now,” Belle said. “Besides, talking about this is distracting me from today’s case, so I’d quite like to keep doing it.” She looked at him critically, and for a few moments, silence reigned. What she couldn’t understand was why Gold suddenly seemed to want to do everything in his power to make her hate him. He had already told that her he respected her, that he thought that she was wonderful. And she knew that he was telling the truth; if there was one thing that a career spent in courtrooms and law offices had brought her, it was a respect for the truth and the ability to discern it. He liked her, so why…

Belle’s train of thought broke off in the middle and she went back to that simple realisation.

He liked her.

Possibly in the same way that she liked him?

“Rum?” she began tentatively. “Why are you telling me this?”

“I told you. I’m not a nice man.”

“So, comforting me when I’m upset, making me tea, and telling me the truth about your past constitute not being nice? Personally, I think that’s the opposite of ‘not being nice’.”

Rum gave a frustrated sigh. “Because you deserve the truth and I don’t deserve you,” he said. “You are a wonderful young woman Belle. I’ve told you that before and never doubt its veracity. And I’ve been falling in love with you since the day we met, but I know that a bitter, ruthless, vicious man like me does not deserve a wonderful woman like you.”

Belle smiled, setting her teacup on the desk and pulling her chair a little bit closer to him.

“You are a lovely man, Rum. I’ve told you that before and you should never doubt its veracity. And I am the only one who gets to decide who deserves me.”

Rum smiled. “That’s true. No-one could ever make your mind up for you.”

“I find that an asset in the legal profession,” Belle said. “We’ve all already made our own minds up, so all that’s left to do is make the jury’s minds up for them. We’d never get anywhere if we started being persuaded by the other side ourselves.”

“Very shrewd.”

Belle closed her hand over Rum’s where it was resting in his lap, fingers curled loosely around his cane. “You’re dragging me off topic here,” she scolded lightly. “As I was saying, I’m the only who gets to decide who deserves me, and I have decided that you do.” She quirked an eyebrow at him. “Now, we’ve both presented the facts of the case, Counsel. It’s up to you what you do with them.”

Gold chuckled. “No-one’s called me Counsel for a very long time.”

“I don’t think you ever really lose it at heart,” Belle said. “So what do you say?”

For a long time, Gold didn’t say anything, just looking down at their clasped hands over his cane.

“I don’t really think that there are words for it,” he said eventually, and then he moved, leaning in and pressing his lips to Belle’s, bringing his free hand up to cup her cheek as he deepened the kiss. Belle accepted it readily and opened her mouth for him, her tongue dabbing gently at the seam of his own lips until he let her in, and she carded her fingers into his long hair, trying to pull him closer.

His eyes were bright when he finally broke away, his hand still on her cheek, stroking her skin gently and pushing a hair that had escaped her ponytail back behind her ear. There was no regret in his expression, and Belle grinned eagerly.

“I think that said enough,” she said, and she kissed him again, disentangling her fingers from his and hooking both arms around his neck; Gold’s cane clattered to the floor as he let go of it to grab her waist.

“Come here,” he said, his voice gruff with desire once she released him again. “Come closer. I don’t bite.”

His hands on her waist encouraged her off her chair and pulled her down onto his lap, and Belle pressed a hand up against his chest, feeling the warmth of his body and the pounding of his heart through his shirt. She knew that hers was drumming out the same beat, a little excited, a little nervous, a little unable to believe that after months of this little infatuation, it had turned into a reality, that Gold really did like her just as much as she did him. Shifting on his lap, she could feel him stirring beneath her with the first tentative twitches of arousal. Yes, he definitely liked her as much as she did him.

“Ah.” Gold looked a little embarrassed as Belle moved on top of him, knowing that she’d felt his interest in her current cosy position, but she just smiled.

“I take it as a compliment,” she said.

“I can assure you that I am not following in the footsteps of the high court judge who was disbarred for using a penis enlarging pump whilst hearing an appeal.”

Belle took a couple of seconds to digest this statement and burst out laughing, burying her face in Gold’s shoulder.

“Way to kill the mood, Rum,” she mumbled against his jacket.

“All right, the statement could have been better timed, but I like to think that it cheered you up.”

Belle looked up at him.

“Yes, it did. Definitely. But I know what would cheer me up even more.”

“What…” Gold began, but Belle cut him off, stealing another kiss and burying her fingers in his hair again. She had always thought that it looked so wonderfully soft, and now that she had found out just how good it felt, she didn’t think she ever wanted to let go.

She felt Gold’s hands slide down her back to rest on her hips, she reluctantly untangled one hand from his hair to take his and move it to her thigh. He took the hint then, finding the hem of her demure knee length pencil skirt and skimming his hand up under it, hooking one finger into her lace stocking top.

“Are you sure?” he asked once they finally tore themselves away from each other, and Belle nodded, her fingers deftly pulling open his tie and beginning to flick at the buttons of his shirt beneath, exposing a smooth triangle of lightly tanned skin. She bent and pressed a kiss to the hollow of his throat. Something in the back of her mind told her that they should probably wait. Go out for dinner or something, or at least find a bed, rather than doing this right here in the clerks’ office where anyone could walk in and find them.

But then she remembered that all the other clerks had long since gone home, and she and Gold were as good as alone in the court building. She popped open another button of his shirt, sliding a hand inside the fabric and pressing down over his heart to feel his pulse quicken. It was no use, she thought as she squirmed on his lap, trying to get closer. Pencil skirts were all right for the courtroom, but they really were incredibly impractical when all you wanted to do was get as close as possible to a very sexy man who was kissing you as if his life depended on it.

She slipped off his lap, laughing at the little grunt of protest he made at losing the contact with her, and she wasted no time in unzipping her skirt and kicking it off to the side before settling on his lap again, pressing herself in flush, her hips grinding against his. She felt the hard bulge of his erection beneath her and shifted so that her crotch was right on it, exactly where she needed him except with rather too many layers of clothing in the way. The little sensible lawyer voice inside told her that she needed to slow down, but as Gold’s hands came down to cup her ass cheeks and keep her moving against him, she really didn’t want to listen to it.

“Oh Belle,” he groaned, his head falling back and exposing an elegant throat that she couldn’t help but kiss. “Belle, you’re truly a wonder.”

“I do my best,” she replied, finishing off the buttons of his shirt and waistcoat and spreading the two halves, raking her fingers over his chest and scratching at his taut nipples, eliciting a hiss of pleasure and his fingers digging into her buttocks. He looked up at her and raised an eyebrow.

“Two can play at that game, you know,” he said, but he made no move to reciprocate, just pecking little butterfly kisses over her chin and jaw. Impatient and overwhelmed all at once, Belle pushed him back, yanking her blouse open. Gold got the hint, and she moaned as his mouth found her nipple through the thin lace of her bra, lapping delicately at the puckered bud and swirling the tip of his tongue around it until the sensation of the soft fabric against her wet skin was too much to bear. He seemed to sense the overstimulation and moved to the other side, repeating the treatment on her left nipple as his hand found her right breast, cupping and stroking it gently. Belle’s hips bucked up against him again, urging them on. This was what she wanted, what she needed, and right now she needed him and she needed more, as much as he could give her. She snaked a shaking hand down between them to his crotch, squeezing the bulge and causing him to moan against her chest and look up at her from between her breasts, eyes narrowed.

His retaliation was swift and wonderful, a hand coming down to cup her mound, long fingers pressing up against her slit through the silk, rubbing gently before moving the gusset to the side and hooking a finger inside. The feeling of skin on skin made her gasp and wriggle, trying to get him to exactly where she needed him, and Gold growled against her chest.

“You’re so lovely and wet, Belle. I can’t believe you’re so wet and ready just for me.”

“I can,” Belle groaned as his knuckle worked up and down her folds and brushed bluntly over her clit. “You’re so sexy, there’s something about you…”

“Is now the right time to tell you I’ve had daydreams about you dropping things and bending over by the water cooler?” Gold asked.

“I’d say so.” Belle rolled her hips again, trying to make him move, but instead of touching her again he slipping his fingers out of her panties.

“Take these off, sweetheart,” he said, his voice almost pleading as he cupped her again, grinding the heel of his hand down against her mound. “I want to touch you properly and make you scream.”

Belle didn’t think that it would take her long to do just that, and with some awkward fumbling she’d tugged her panties down and they were caught around her left stiletto. Too abstracted by want to do anything about them, she left them there, plunging in against Gold’s mouth again as his hands slipped back between her thighs. She was shaved bare and she could feel just how wet she was getting now that her panties were gone, and glancing down she could see the slick shining on Gold’s fingers as he parted her folds, spreading her delicately with one hand and using the other to touch her clit and dip into her dripping entrance, pressing up inside her easily. Belle dug her fingers into his shoulders desperately, clinging to him as he kept working her steadily towards her climax. His fingers were methodical, the pressure light but confident, and Belle wondered idly in the midst of her ecstasy if it came from so much typing, but then his finger curled inside her to find that sweet spot and all thoughts of keyboards flew out of her mind. She was pretty sure that nothing required that wonderful stroking to type.

“That’s it,” Gold murmured as she groaned, and Belle could feel his hips and thighs shaking with the effort of not thrusting up against her. “Come for me, sweetheart, come apart for me. Take what you need.”

Belle screamed out as a second finger joined the first and curled in just the right way, the pressure against her clit from his thumb joining with the soft petting inside her to bring her up and up and over the edge, her orgasm rushing through her in a wave and the warmth bubbling out from her g-spot through her veins like a firework. She was panting heavily as she finally came back to herself, Gold drawing his fingers out and and stroking gently along her folds to ease her through into the afterglow, and she felt her arms give out a little, collapsing against his chest and groaning with sheer satisfaction. There was a trickle of perspiration running down her back and she could see the sheen of it on Gold’s chest too, and hear his heartbeat pounding away beneath her fingers. He needed a release just as much as she had needed hers and it felt wrong to deny him that for any longer, even though he showed no sign of wanting to let go of her and take his own pleasure. Belle moved slowly, settling herself firmly on his lap as his fingers moved away from her centre and she dragged her hand down the stripe of bare skin shown by his open shirt until she reached his belt buckle, undoing it and slipping a hand under his waistband until she found his cock, hot and hard and straining against its fabric confines. She unfastened his fly and between them they managed to push his trousers and boxers down far enough to free his cock. He was large for his height, long and thick, and Belle wanted nothing more than to feel him pushing inside her and filling her up. Her inner walls were clutching around nothing, missing his fingers inside her, and she curled her hand around his length, pumping the tip of him a little.

“Have you got a condom?” she asked.

“Yes, hang on…” The final word became something between a moan and a curse and his hand scrabbled for purchase on the arm of the chair, fingers still slippery from her juices and unable to grip. Belle eased up on her grip, letting go of his cock until she was just holding him loosely; as much as she enjoyed watching him so distracted and coming undone, she knew that they wouldn’t be able to go any further if he was too mind-blown to find a condom, and she desperately wanted him inside her, to feel them joined fully. After so many months of mutual want, they both needed this and Belle would not have either of them denied it.

Gold licked his fingers clean of her juices and wiped them on the tails of his shirt where the stain wouldn’t show.

“You taste delicious.”

There was a rasp in his voice as he spoke, arousal and awe and desperate need all in one. From the hungry look in his dark eyes, he wanted more of what he’d just tasted, and Belle would be all too happy to let him have it once they’d found completion together. She wanted to find out if his mouth would be as wonderful between his legs as his fingers had been. She doubted he’d disappoint, not when he had taken care of her so very thoroughly.

Gold reached into his inside jacket pocket and pulled out his wallet before wrestling the jacket off altogether and tossing it over the desk where it slithered down onto the floor. He extracted a condom from the wallet, which joined his jacket in short order, and quickly rolled it on, stroking his length roughly a couple of times to take the edge off before looking up at Belle.

“Are you ready?” he asked. His voice was breathy and barely more than a growl, and Belle nodded eagerly, lifting her hips and pressing in close against his chest to allow him to line them up and press the head of his cock inside her. Belle sank down onto him, taking a moment to adjust to his length and girth before giving an experimental roll of her hips. Gold gave a guttural groan, his head lolling back, eyes closed as his pelvis thrust up into hers, hips snapping to meet her movement for movement.

“Oh Belle, sweetheart, you’re heavenly.”

His hands were on her bottom, holding her steady as her body rocked above him, and she braced her hands on his shoulders as she felt him move one hand shakily round between them, to find her clit above where they were joined and pet at her, rubbing insistently.

“I want to feel you come again,” Gold breathed. “Want to feel you come around me, so hot and tight and gorgeous.”

It wouldn’t take long, Belle thought, biting her lip and taking him a little deeper, the sated, fulfilled feeling warming her blood. His fingertip found her clit in just the way she wanted, and she felt herself clutch around his cock, moaning his name as she came again.

_“Rum!”_

“Yes Belle, yes, that’s it, come for me love, I’m almost there…”

He swore, the hand still holding her ass digging fingers in and his hips stilling as he came, following her over the edge. Belle just let her whole body relax in his arms, tucking her face in against his shoulder and breathing in the fresh scent of his cologne as his head drooped forward onto her shoulder. She would have been quite happy to stay like that, safe in his arms and feeling him softening inside her, but she knew that she had to move; Gold’s hand was slipping beneath her to grip the base of the condom as he pulled out, and his embrace was absent as he dealt with the used contraceptive, balling it up in a tissue and tossing it towards the waste paper basket. Belle watched his movements through sated, slightly sleepy eyes, and she had to give a snort of laughter as his arms back around her, stroking lightly up and down her back and holding her close.

“What’s tickled your fancy?” Gold asked.

“I’d have thought that the answer to that was obvious,” she whispered in his ear. “But in all honesty I was thinking about your poor colleague who’s going to come in tomorrow morning and find a condom in their waste basket.

Gold shrugged. “What happens in the clerks’ office, stays in the clerks’ office. I’m certain that far more interesting things have been found in waste paper baskets in here before now.”

Belle didn’t reply, just enjoying being held for a while. In the end, it really didn’t matter whether she had won or lost her case today. Tomorrow was another day and there would be another case, and she would win it or lose it as justice would decide. All she could do was hope to deliver a better case next time. And if she didn’t, well, she would just keep pushing until she did. And hopefully, she thought, looking into Gold’s dark eyes, narrowed with satisfaction, she would still have Gold to commiserate or indeed celebrate with.

“So what happens now?” she asked presently.

“What would you like to happen now?” Gold asked. “I think we’ve both made our feelings clear.”

Belle giggled, looking down at their state of undress. “I think that’s beyond reasonable doubt.”

“Let’s not get started on the courtroom puns,” Gold said, sounding slightly pained. “I think we need to have gone on at least one date before puns are allowed.”

“How long do I have to wait for at least one date?” Belle asked.

Gold made a show of looking at his watch.

“How long will it take you to make yourself decent?” he asked.

Belle just smiled and kissed him deeply, cupping his cheeks and running her thumbs over the rough scrape of his shadow where it was beginning to come in. She felt Gold’s hands splay over her back, pulling her in closer.

“You’d like to make this official?” she asked once he had broken away, and Gold nodded.

“There’s nothing I’d like more.”

“Then give me ten minutes to freshen up. After that, I get free rein on courtroom puns.”

Gold rolled his eyes as she slid off his lap and he set about tucking himself back into his trousers and refastening his shirt. As they left the office arm in arm, wandering through the court building and past the courtroom that they had vacated not so very long ago, Belle smiled. She’d lost the case, but she’d won something far more valuable.

 


End file.
